# Codebook: panel_final.csv / panel_for_stata.dta

## Variables

| Variable | Type | Description |
|----------|------|-------------|
| `month` | date (YYYY-MM-DD) | First day of the calendar month |
| `quote_asset` | string | ISO 4217 currency code (lowercase) |
| `country` | string | Country name |
| `economy_group` | string | "AE" (Advanced Economy) or "EMDE" (Emerging Market and Developing Economy), per IMF WEO classification |
| `is_emde` | integer | 1 if EMDE, 0 if AE |
| `year` | integer | Calendar year |
| `vol_stablecoins` | float | Monthly USDT trading volume (all variants: ERC-20, TRC-20, Omni, Avalanche), aggregated across 16 exchanges, in local currency equivalent |
| `vol_unbacked` | float | Monthly BTC spot trading volume, aggregated across 16 exchanges, in local currency equivalent |
| `stablecoin_share` | float | USDT share = vol_stablecoins / (vol_stablecoins + vol_unbacked) * 100. This is the dependent variable in the paper (equation 1). Range: [0, 100] |
| `log_m2` | float | Natural logarithm of broad money supply (M2), from the IMF Money and Financial Statistics (MFS) database |
| `d_log_m2` | float | Monthly log-change in M2: log(M2_t) - log(M2_{t-1}). Winsorized at the 1st and 99th percentiles. This is the main explanatory variable in the paper (equation 2) |

## Notes

- The panel is unbalanced. Coverage varies by currency depending on when exchanges began offering fiat pairs for that currency.
- Cryptocurrency volumes are aggregated across 16 exchanges: Binance, Kraken, Bitfinex, Coinbase, OKX, Bybit, KuCoin, Bitget, Bitstamp, Gemini, Upbit, WazirX, Bitso, Ripio, Bitkub, and Bitbank.
- `d_log_m2` is winsorized at the 1st and 99th percentiles to limit the influence of outliers in high-inflation economies.
- Missing values in `log_m2` or `d_log_m2` indicate that IMF MFS data was not available for that country-month.
